Due to storage space and bandwidth requirements associated with hosting digital images in a network environment, a number of hosting websites have emerged. These hosting websites host digital images and allow the digital images to be embedded within external websites using image source references to the hosting website. In operation, when a guest requests a webpage having a digital image embedded therein from an external site, the digital image is obtained from the hosting website rather than the external website. Thus, the external website no longer needs to store the digital image or serve the digital image to the guest. As a result, the storage space and bandwidth requirements for the external website are substantially reduced.
One issue with the typical hosting website is that the hosting website may lose advertising opportunities. More specifically, the hosting website may be a photosharing website. In a normal photosharing operation, a guest views digital images at the photosharing website. While viewing the digital images, advertisements may be placed around the digital images on the webpages viewed by the guest. In contrast, when the digital images are hosted for an external website, only the image is provided to the guest node. The content surrounding the digital image on the webpage viewed by the guest is provided by the external website. Thus, the external website, rather than the hosting website, gains an advertising opportunity. Each time a digital image is served to a guest for an external website, the photosharing website loses an advertising opportunity.
Accordingly, there remains a need for a system and method for hosting digital images embedded in external websites that adds additional content such as advertisements to the digital images when serving the digital images to guests of the external websites.